Baptistan Grumbles
by lotuskasumi
Summary: From a prompt on Tumblr: "How about Clara dragging the Doctor shopping and having a regular domestic day. He's acting all grumpy but secretly he loves spending time with her and loves the idea she wants him around." (Whouffle/Twelve x Clara)


Overheard one day, in Plato's Closet:

"D'you really need another shirt? You're wearing one. One's enough."

"And what happens when this shirt's in the wash?"

His silence lasted a beat too long, though one quick look up at his half-turned away face told Clara he was only seconds away from coming up with something presumably clever in response. She cut him to it.

"Besides, hark who's talking." She held a short-sleeved, creme-white blouse up to her chest and flattened it with the other hand, glancing down to see how it fit.

The Doctor frowned at her, as he was now prone to do: a sort of frown that doesn't meet the eyes but instead transforms his face into a tremendous scowling event. It would drive away a more sensitive sort, convincing them he was built on nothing but disapproval and grumpiness. But Clara knew better. _Doth protest too much_ was not a phrase Clara often had a chance to use — perhaps in regards to Linda, about a Linda-like comment muttered into a glass of red wine, but only to herself in the comforts and satisfaction of her own mind, where it could be properly appreciated without any kind of backbiting retort. She could, and would, apply it here to the Doctor and his own grumbling. She could, and would continue to, see through his new mask as certainly as if it were made of the finest, thinnest glass. The trouble was how best to crack it. Gently, with insistent, steady taps, or with one decisive, obliterating strike?

A combination of the two should suit nicely, Clara thought.

"What's that mean?" the Doctor asked, baldly, bluntly, reaching out to prod one of the frilly tufts at the top of the sleeve. "_Ridiculous,_" he muttered, which made Clara smile.

Clara handed him the blouse to hold, along with the few other bits of clothing she'd deposited to his waiting, stone-stiff arms, like a mobile mannequin made for her specific shopping convenience.

She decided to answer his question with one of her own. "Do you remember our trip to the Titanian Vale last week?" Clara asked, cautiously examining another shirt: longer sleeved, of a thin, almost gossamer material that had the miraculous benefit of not being entirely see-through. The buttons were as black as ink, off-setting the rich purple color of the rest of the shirt, but it was long enough to look dangerously shapeless. Clara raised her eyes off the shirt to the Doctor's face, wondering.

"You broke a fairy ring and disrupted court procedures," he said, shaking his head once in a terse, tense jerk, his lips pressed together tightly.

"After _you _spent a half hour deciding between two shirts." Clara hung the purple shirt back up, giving it a sympathetic little pat as she returned it to the display.

"Half hour?"

"Hm, yeah, that doesn't sound right, does it?"

"It doesn't, no."

"Probably more like forty minutes. Closer to fifty."

"That's ridiculous."

"That's the second time you've used that word today," Clara said, smiling at him in a way that reached all the way up her eyes and made them gleam. The Doctor knew that look. He paused at the sight of that look, and then reached out to snatch a simple black shirt off the nearest rack. This was far different than the rest Clara had picked out so far. String-thin straps for sleeves, with a bodice that curved gently at the top and was accompanied by a sweet pink bow in the center of the chest. It toed the line of appropriately understated to suspiciously adorable.

Clara tried not to laugh. She'd seen similar designs on articles of clothing in a particular drawer in her dresser, and was far too eager to find a way to mention his unintentionally revealed preference. Her contemplative, mischievous silence gave the Doctor a chance to catch up.

"It's the second time I've had to," he said, eying her carefully. She didn't quite recognize that look. Not yet. "Wanna make it a nice, even three?"

"Threes aren't even," Clara insisted, trying to think of a skirt that would match the top he'd chosen. It wasn't _too _bad, all things considered. Sleek, in a way. And she had secretly borrowed a cardigan from his own closet that would go nicely with it.

"Yes, you'd know about that _now_, wouldn't you?" the Doctor muttered, filtering through plaid skirts in reds, blacks, and greens until he landed on a black pencil skirt buried behind the rest. Clara couldn't help but appreciate it. It would match nearly every top she'd picked out today, and looked like the one she'd had to recently throw away, considering its deplorable state post-Titanian revels. Fairy vomit, as it turned out, was nearly acidic.

"Meaning what?"

"Meaning how's the maths boy?"

Clara frowned . "He's not a maths boy."

"Oh, right. A maths _man_."

"Shut up."

"Why isn't he doing this?" the Doctor continued, watching Clara dig into her purse for her wallet as they stomped off together to the register. Elbows knocked as they moved, then their hands brushed alongside one another, and she couldn't resist throwing him a side-ways, knowing glance he returned with an especially impressive scowl. "Why isn't he here with you today?"

"Because you are," Clara said, keeping her voice low.

"And why am I here?" he replied, his voice far louder than it had to be. Clara couldn't understand why people weren't staring. They had to stand out like a disastrously nuclear beacon, hellbent on arguing.

"Because I asked you."

"And why _did _you ask me?" he finished off, continuing to talk louder than he should, staring at her for longer than Clara would have liked, given the current topic.

"Because we're —" Clara started, then stopped, catching herself in his eyes. It was the same look from earlier, the one she hadn't quite been able to place.

It made her think of the words: _"Please see me."_

It made her think of the confession: _"I need you."_

It made her think of the day she told him frankly, with honest words and a calm, steady gaze, about Danny. _"Moved on? Good for you. Keep the hope alive." _

Ignoring the way the cashier was eying the two of them, Clara turned so that she could face the Doctor properly, his frowning, somber face reflected back in her wide, understanding eyes. He leaned back from the sight, and then froze when she smiled, a different smile than any of the ones before: an expression as close as one could get to a kiss.

"Because you'll be honest with me. And honesty is important when clothes are the topic of discussion."

"Just clothes?"

"And other things."

"What other things?"

Clara almost pitied him. "Don't you know?"

He did. Of course he did. His silence suggested so.

Clara gave the Doctor's shoulder a comforting pat, squeezing him once, her touch lingering, as she grabbed the clothes out of his arms with her other hand. He relinquished them quickly, easily, dare she say gratefully? And though Clara hadn't turned to see it properly, she could tell by the way her heart lifted that he now wore a warm, gentle smile.

* * *

><p>*The title is a reference to the Player Queen from the play within Hamlet, whom Queen Gertrude describes exactly as: doth protest[ing] too much. Protest is being used in the modern sense here, whereas for Billy Shakes it would have meant a vowoath.

**There used to be a second-hand clothing shop by my house named Plato's Closet. Considering this series' little nods to philosophers of both Greek and Roman origins, I figured it'd be nice to have it set here.

***And, as always, thank you incredibly, massively, **tremendously**, _eternally_ to everyone who reviews these little fics. It always makes me smile to see what you have to say, and I can only hope to keep entertaining you! Have a nice day, duckies.


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